14 Words by Email

Wednesday, 5 June 2013

The far-right, anti-immigration National Front, led by Marine Le
Pen, would match France’s mainstream political parties if European
elections were held this weekend, according to a poll published on
Wednesday.

The survey revealed that the far-right National Front, the
governing Socialist party, and the main centre-right opposition UMP were
neck-and-neck on exactly 21 percent each of public support.
Public opinion firm Ifop, along with right-leaning weekly magazine
Valeurs Actuelles asked respondents to choose from a series of party
lists, with specific named leaders, “if the European elections were to
take place next Sunday.”
Some 21 percent chose the Socialist
Party, led by Party President Harlem Désir, the same percentage of
support given to both the UMP, led by Jean-François Copé and the
National Front, led by Marine Le Pen.
Just nine percent chose the ‘Front de gauche’ (Leftist Front), led by 2012 presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
EELV (Europe Ecology – the Greens), led by current French housing
minister Cécile Duflot, got 7.5 percent support, and the centrist Modem
(Democratic Movement), led by repeat presidential candidate François
Bayrou, got seven percent support.
The UDI (Union of Democrats
and Independents), a splinter party formed during the UMP’s fraught
leadership battle last autumn, and led by Jean-Louis Borloo, polled at
6.5 percent.
The Gaullist, eurosceptic DLR (Arise the Republic) party, led by Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, got three percent.
The NPA (New Anticapitalist Party), led by former postman and 2007
presidential candidate Olivier Besancenot got two percent support.Uncomfortable reading for mainstream parties
Wednesday’s poll will make worrying reading for both Socialist French
President François Hollande, and main opposition leader Jean-François
Copé.
Hollande has suffered record unpopularity among French voters,
amid historic levels of unemployment and a tax evasion scandal which
forced former budget minister and key ally Jérome Cahuzac to resign in
April.
For his part, Copé had to endure a poisonous battle with
former Prime Minister François Fillon in order to become UMP leader
last autumn.
In May, The Local reported that former President
Nicolas Sarkozy, who has somewhat overshadowed Copé’s leadership with
repeated hints at a return to politics, topped a poll of French voters asked to choose their preferred president in 2017.
National Front leader Le Pen came in second, and Hollande a distant third.
At the time, Socialist spokesman David Essouline condemned the far-right rhetoric of Le Pen.
"Behind lofty, misleading comments against bankers, she only
becomes concrete when it's about attacking unions and immigrants," he
said in a statement.
Along with elections to the European Parliament, 2014 will bring local, municipal elections to France.
In February, The Local reported how the National Front has opened up a ‘candidate’s college’ called “Campus Bleu Marine,” in an effort to boost the party’s representation in local authorities throughout France.
Le Pen garnered 18 percent of the vote in last May’s presidential
election, just failing to replicate the performance of her late father,
and party founder, Jean-Marie Le Pen on the same stage.
In
2002, Jean-Marie Le Pen sent shockwaves throughout the political world
by outpolling Socialist candidate and incumbent French Prime Minister
Lionel Jospin in the first round of the presidential elections.
Incumbent centre-right President Jacques Chirac went on to get 82 percent of votes in the run-off election.
Dan MacGuill